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Over the course of the Big Project I had to dramatically change my whole project because the theme behind the project fell through and didn’t have enough material to be sustainable as a twitter bot. In creating the bot what did went well is how the new titles formed together and were very entertaining. Using the different sections within the bot and breaking up the original titles by the author allowed growth for the project in giving a stronger variety, What went badly was that at some points there was some grammatical errors in my bot so those of course had to be adjusted, There was also the issue that at some points the titles were getting redundant so I had to make another layer after presenting the project to make sure that there wouldn’t be any repeats. There was a goal from the original project that I would be able to make my bot tweet others and be able to retweet however, with the time constraints and using cheap bots done quick I wasn’t able to do either of those things. If I had to do this project again I would do it the same exact way. The reason why is because I loved how I had no idea what title was going to come out next. I also think replying to tweets or retweeting would be irrelevant for this bot because it’s sole purpose is to entertain and show the creativity behind the author and how the titles the bot creates can honestly be used for one of the authors up and coming novels in the future.

Resources

The main resource of this project ended up being the cheap bots done quick versus the excel template. The reason why I chose this template is because I enjoyed working with it and I had a better understanding of the layout and how I could adjust it and customize it for my twitter bot. The other resource of the project was amazon for all of the titles from his novels that I had to put in and make sure that by breaking them up they made some kind of sense. I think if I had to add any additional resources to this particular project it would have to be more authors work. I would want to add in other titles from well known authors that might not be from the same genre and see how they would combine to make a new and unusual title. An example of this would be combining chuck tingle novel titles with Harry Potter series or The Hunger Games. I could only imagine what the titles would turn out but maybe for another time. If I had more time I would also want the possibility of working with another bot forum just to see what other functions could be done with the bot just to make it less generic.

Schedule

At first the schedule was going alright with the original project until it came up to transcript of the novel that is when I came to a road block of the project that with not enough quotes I wasn’t allowed to have enough material for the twitter bot. So during the last week before the twitter bot was due I had to change the project completely. During that week I had to: create a new twitter account, add profile and background to the twitter account, create a unique name for the account, go through the twitter bot and add all of the broken up titles and phrases. So I had to completely revise my project schedule because it ended up being a whole new project without Janelle or Bridget so I had to do it all on my own this time. Which was fine because it all worked out.

Outcomes

For this particular project the goal was to get the bot running properly and making sure that whatever it ended up tweeting would actually make some kind of sense (in chucks world that is). In that aspect of the project I succeeded since my bot is working, the tweets are legible and there are no errors within the bot. I wasn’t able to get the bot to retweet or like other accounts because I disabled the function on the bot. Because the bot is some what inappropriate I was fearful of what people might ask and how it would reply since all it is are broken up gay pornographic book titles. I didn’t see the use or the purpose of it so I kept it like that. I feel successful with this project because the titles were entertaining and the bot is functioning. I enjoyed how it turned out because the titles are hilarious. Most importantly the bot works and it is still running now so it was a great turnout.

Executive Summary

The goal of this project was to have a functioning twitter bot and one that was entertaining for everyone. In this case it in now for a mature audience. The overall purpose I had for the project was to shed light on a holiday movie classic around halloween time and now the project ended up shedding light on a unique author with unexplainable titles that can’t be unseen. The project created new titles out of the original ones that he has and allowed me to show the class and others how his titles are so far out there that at one point many believed that he most likely used a twitter bot to create his titles in the first place. I learned that in order for the titles to not be repetitive in the cheap bot there had to be more layers of functions that intertwined to create better titles. I also learned that overall this project was something that I would want to go back and improve on some more because I liked how it created something that no one will ever forget.

Over the course of this project I ran into an issue with the final product not based on the method but based on the character of choice that I used for the project. Originally I was doing a twitter bot based on the character Hocus Pocus Mary Sanderson of the Sanderson sisters. When going through the film I came to the realization that when using the twitter bot she didn’t have enough quotes in the film in order to have randomization. I decided instead to use book titles based off of the novelist Dr. Chuck Tingle. He is a gay pornographic novelist who is my opinion known for off the wall titles that make sexual stories with unusual creatures to objects. An example of one of his novels is “Buttception: A butt within a butt within a butt.” I found this author from a BuzzFeed article that highlighted unusual book titles and he was the only one who had a link to all of his novels since they wan’t just one that they could highlight. I found this back during my sophomore year of college. It wasn’t until we read a website during this course that was about “Trump Facts.” He was by surprise the author of the website and it just reminded me about all of his unusual books and his overall persona. He has a degree in sensual massage, a black belt and his son edits his books. Overall he is an unforgettable character and it inspired me to use it for a twitter bot to create new book titles. I decided that I am going to use Cheap Bots Done Quick versus the spreadsheet because I thought it would be a good way to see the layers of the broken down titles. So in the course of the project I had to create a new twitter account and named it @tinglemysenses. I thought it was a clever way to use the authors last name and then took the image of a T-Rex as the profile picture. This is to signify his use of dinosaurs in his novels and then a galaxy background to describe his use of space and spaceships. It shows that there is no limits when it comes to his book titles. I kept the template the same and replaced the three sections, “alternatives”, “origin” and “completely different” by allowing the tittles to intertwine with the layers and creating phrases that would seem “chuck tingle worthy.” I wanted to makes sure that none of the new titles would actually be an original which is why I broke up the titles word by word. He has at least 30 books so I knew that it would have a good variety of titles created. I also started out with the twitter bot tweeting at every 10 min. just to make sure that it was running smoothly and that if there were any grammatical errors I could adjust the bot accordingly. I knew by doing this project it would be a risk in terms of the fear of it being too inappropriate but I am hoping that the entertaining factor will overshadow it and that it would bring laughter to anyone who ever finds it. I also decided that I am going to keep the bot up just to see what happens and to look at it in the future to reflect on a project I did back in my college days. I will check back in soon with my final thoughts and reflection on this project! Wish me luck!

Rationale: Even though we are week past halloween it has come to my attention that I am not ready to give it up just yet. Hocus Pocus which is a halloween classic in my book has been a movie played over and over since I was a child. It is something that I look forward to every halloween because it brings me so much joy and happiness. So as my friends and I in the class were talking about this project we wanted to incorporate this film while showing how learning code this semester can be fun and entertaining in film culture. The way I’m going to do this is I’m going to be creating a twitter bot using python code and using sayings that the character Mary Sanderson of the Sanderson sisters. Bridget and Janelle are doing the same thing but with the other sisters to make it seem more interactive. The audience is all ages who enjoys the film and will see this as a way of bringing the characters to life. This is a way to be creative in the way that the twitter bot interacts with the other characters and the way it is displayed on twitter.

Risks and Rewards: In completing this project the results not be the way that I want them to be. An example of this is that when creating the twitter bot my goal is to get the quotes from the film to come out without the words getting disoriented which can possibly happen with my code. I also know there can be a risk if the code gives me errors and I won’t be able to figure out how to fix it. The other problem that might go wrong is that I might have an issue with figuring out what the syntax error might be in the code. I have taken a computer course and this is something I have dealt with in the past and it has been a challenge for me. The rewards from this project is that this will create a dialogue between me and the two other students will make this project so rewarding. This will also bring up memories that I hope will be joyous. I also will feel rewarded by making my first twitter bot and knowing that I can create more in the future.

Resources: In order for this to work I have been looking up sites that have different types of twitter bot makers. I have been trying to use the one that Professor Whalen has created using Google Sheets so with his permission I am going to see if this is going to be a tool I can use. I am also going to need to use the Jupyter Notebook in order to keep all of my progress of my work together and make sure it saves all of my code. I will also am going to need to use GitHub because this has different types of codes that have used to create twitter bots and it could give me an idea of what pieces of code I will need in order to get my twitter bot to do what I want to do which is tweet, favorite, and retweet (hopefully). I have also been looking into youtube videos that have been showing how many options there are in the methods of creating a twitter bot. I will need to work on this about two hours a day to make effective process without feeling overwhelmed. This is because when trying to create something like this you want to make it enjoyable and not stressful and in regards to code there is a fine line between the two.

Schedule:

November 10: Create Twitter Account

November 15: Start Transcript on the Film – This means going through the film and finding quotes I want to use for the tweets.

November 17: Begin working on creating the code for the twitter bot- this will mean that I will find a source or site that will assist me in creating the twitter bot and for the code to be completed.

November 22: Work on syntax errors within the code- this will be used to correct any of the problems or kinks that I find within the code.

November 29: Test out the twitter bot-Once all of the errors are fixed does the twitter bot work out properly?

December 1: Try to see if the twitter bot interacts with one another-This will include Bridget and Janelle because they have the other two main characters and I want to see if their bots are functioning as well.

December 6: Present the Results for the Class- I will present my process and how I got to final project and evaluate it as a whole.

Assessment: I will know that the project is successful when the twitter bot completes all of the functions that I have given to it. This will include tweeting out the quotes that have been given, being able to retweet the other characters and favorite their tweets. I think that you should grade it based on my code and how far I get in trying to make the twitter bot to actually work with little to no syntax errors.

Executive Summary: I have gave myself the task of creating a twitter bot based on one of my favorite movie characters. The goal is to combine coding with simplistic entertainment and something that can be encouraging children that they can do something like this also with something that they might enjoy. I know that there are multiple ways to create but with python I’m hopefully applying what we did during this semester to a project.

def doubletrouble(sequence):
#In order to improve on this project I need to try to work on using other forms of function versus sequence
result = []
for x in sequence:
result = result + [x * 13]
return result

Now that is out of the way, onto my process of creating my coding environment. Before this course I had already taken computer science so most of the software essentials that I had previously downloaded are already together in one division of my launchpad. I already have brackets, sublime text, and text wrangler which are all useful and have been helpful in the past so I hoped they would assist me in this book. That was not the case. I had to re-install good old python which as I have previously stated in my blog we have a love/hate relationship hence the gif that I have decided to put in this post. There was also a recommendation to install anaconda in order to have the iPython Notebook. This is when things started to get a bit complicated for me. When I tried to first download anaconda in class it ended up just giving me random text and froze my computer. It wasn’t until I uninstalled the software and searched “iPython Notebook” instead that it said I had to have python installed first before I could do anything else. Once that was done things started to make a lot more sense. As I have realized with the rest of the class they have now named the notebook to Jupyter and I also figured out the free trial look on the internet doesn’t work at all. I ended up installing everything and played around with it trying to figure out how everything works. I then started the double double project using the jupyter and saved it there within the anaconda software. I had the project from chapter one saved in a class folder that I made in the beginning of the semester for this class using sublime text to modify the original code. I also tried to use github by creating an account and trying to figure out how to upload my code but there was no such luck. Overall my coding environment has an endless amount of software options and a whole lot of applications that still don’t make sense. Even though I have a lot of coding platforms I know that over time it will all make more sense the more I use them and have a better grasp on their purpose. I look forward to hearing everyone else’s environment and what measures they took in order to make it their own.

When I heard in class that we were going to learn some programming code the first thing that happened was my stomach turned into knots. It wasn’t because I haven’t touched any type of code in my life, in fact I took Introduction to Computer Science but for me the experience was one that wasn’t an easy battle. It was a new language for me and I felt that everyone around me was foreign and I was the only one who needed a translator. I would look over the codes and the problems over and over to the point that it all still was “mumbo jumbo.” It took me from reading from this textbook we have this semester to realize that this time around I’m going to have to go in with an open mind. I actually do want to learn programming because I feel that it is something that is a gateway to so many things that we couldn’t imagine. The idea that we can create a program that can act as a function on the internet is out of this world. I see it as an opportunity to try to think outside of what we know and what is safe and take a risk. It is a chance to let the mind wander and find a new way of looking at problems. I want to learn because I didn’t retain it well the first time around and I’m determined to improve over the course of the semester. It’s important to me to not give up when I feel like I am stuck and that this is no way of getting out of it. I want to prove to myself that if I put the effort and drive into programming I will succeed. When it gets tough I will have to remind myself that there is a way to figure it out it just might take more time and practice to get to that point. I want to make sure that this time it sticks because I want it to be a skill that I can keep growing and use sometime in the future. I also want it to just expand my logic and stubborn ways of thinking and push the envelope. I have a goal to not only be able to solve some code problems but be able to make a code that will allow me to move objects within a window. The reason why I choose that is because that was the project I had in my other class that I felt I did not achieve and feel satisfied with the outcome. I want to make it stronger and I want in the end to feel accomplished.

So for this image I took parts of the novel that stood out to me and put it into an apocalyptic setting that was etched into my mind as how the end of that time period came to a stop. All was in ruin, rubble and the all the peripherals came as one to take over the people and make this their world. The red cube represents not only what Connor became at one point to be on the defense during the fight but in this image it is seen as an unusual object, out of place and the center of attention. I did this to show that this cube represented resistance against the fight. I wanted to take what I imagined what the end of the world to look like and create a visual that would have elements of Gibson’s novel within it. It came with a theme that I created that from our creativity and progression of technology could also be the beginning to our own destruction. As humans we are always trying to find ways to progress and create the next best thing. To be more efficient, more effective but that isn’t always the case. Sometimes it is the simple things are the parts of life that we take for granted and we lose the sense of what we started out with in the first place. It amazes me everyday what the mind can create and that was displayed in this novel. Within this novel I got to see Flynne become part of a totally different time period and have another life that you could see she desired to be her own at one point. A sense of losing her identity was drawn within the story as it unfolded and corruption began to form. Corruption is seen today and in this foreign world that Gibson created no matter what time period it is that will never change. There is a shot of nature that is still preserved and is seen as something precious and under appreciated. It might question if technology is going to make us put nature on the back burner or create a bridge to make it become a priority. When I started this novel I would have never guessed that these thoughts and ideas about life now would ever intertwine with the story line but it proved that this fantasy world might not be that different from our own.

As I have gone through this semester there has been some changes to my digital identity. I still use Facebook as a way to reach out to family and friends but in this semester it was a way to vent my emotions through the issues that I went through. I used to just scroll through Facebook mindlessly and like posts here and there but now I actually pay attention and try to discover more. I want to know what is going on out in the world and even though some might see Facebook as a site that doesn’t give substantial information it actually does. It keeps me up to date on political issues because I have friends who post it daily. I see if there is a major news break because at the side of Facebook it does show what is trending which gives me a general idea of what is catching the attention of millions of people. Even though I have not only a twitter but YouTube, SoundCloud, Tumblr and Pinterest I realized that I don’t really use any of those. I sometimes go on them if I need it for projects for school but nothing that really ties myself to it personally. They all have my name and my picture but I haven’t put enough information on them about myself to make it a part of my “digital identity.” The only change after the course of this semester was the fact that we had to create our domain to be one that could be used for the future. From doing that project I feel that it became a new outlet professionally that I could keep updating in the future if I decide to buy my domain from the school. On my personal site not only was I able to use my name I talked about my progress in college and display all of my projects that I have done over my college career. If I could say anything from this semester it is that having a digital identity needs to be a necessity because it will give potential jobs a chance to see you and what you can do for them in the future.

Cutting down the barriers. This video is my final product. I used iMovie and I started out with this journalism project trying to talk about the past journalists and how far they have come in journalism. The more that I researched the more my objective shifted completely. I focused more on the shocking factors that come in the career of journalism. I first started out by looking up images of journalists in dangerous places. I then went onto YouTube and found clips of live journalism to add to my video to make it more diverse just having pictures. I used 4K downloader software for both the video and audio content of this video. I decided to add an instrumental version of My Hero by Foo Fighters. I chose this song for a couple of reasons. I first thought it was an empowering song that representing journalists who are heroes for many who are going through rough times and they reveal the story to the world. I also chose the song because I thought that it went really well with the content that I decided to use for this video. I wanted to tie everything together and make sure that there wasn’t any awkward background noise with only my voice in the video. I started out by going through the images and putting them in a file and then uploading them all in iMovie. I went through each one and made sure that the timing of them was right and that the images weren’t cropped unusual. I then downloaded a video from YouTube of live journalistic content by Tim Pool a journalist who has shown what risks need to be taken in order for the world to see what he sees. I then went through the video and took three clips that I felt showed examples of journalism. It showed protests, people behind the desk and riots that represented all sides of journalism that are revealed from behind the lens. I then took out the audio from the video clips to make sure that it didn’t go over the audio that was coming from the song and from myself. I put my personal voice of opinion within the video itself using my microphone on my Beats headphones. I then adjusted the sound and made sure that it was heard over the song. Lastly I published it on my personal YouTube page that I use for projects from previous classes.

The more I worked on my video the more passionate I felt about these journalists. In my mind they felt like the unsung heroes that no one will ever know. I felt an obligation to talk about how much goes into the news and that in this time no one really thinks anything of it. Everything has gone digital so all it takes is for a person to pick up their phone, open an app, and scroll quickly through the news. No one thinks about the person who is running into harms way, getting arrested for trying to tell the truth, and keeping silent until their death to keep the story safe. I think was really motivated me in this module was the fact that this was my original dream job. When you are kid you have a bunch of things that you want to be when you grow up. I had the dream to be a journalist and tell everyone the news. I would go to the Newseum with my parents that is up in Washington D.C. and would stay there for hours looking over countless newspapers with so many stories to tell and it was just so moving to me. Then I would look at the photojournalists who would capture the lives of the weak and the voiceless. It was that kind of power that came from a story and image that really pushed me in this module. It reminded me that there is so much that we learn from the news and that I take it for granted. I learned from this module that there are a ton of programs and sites that are there just to protect journalists. I learned that the number of deaths is way more than I ever wanted to see. I learn that this is the risk that they knew had to be taken. It is all for the truth to be heard and to let there be no more silence.

This is the last module of the semester. This has been an eventful semester and I can’t wait to share the final product of this project. I decided to join the Journalism Module. The reason I chose this module is because when I was younger my dream was to become a journalist. I loved to write and I was obsessed with newspapers. I loved just reading the news and learning about what was going on all over the world. As you can tell now that wasn’t the path that I ended up on but I still believe that journalism and journalists are the unsung heroes in the media world. I decided that I wanted to do my module on breaking the barriers of journalism and research what risks were taken when it came down to getting a story. I started out by looking up journalism. I wanted to see if there were websites that were for journalists like a hub that they would just gather together and talk about their experiences. I discovered something different. I found a ton of protection programs. When coming upon this discovery it didn’t fascinate me, it actually made me very nervous. I was concerned that in order for these websites to be so popular and on the top of the list of results when it comes to google than it must be a prevalent issue. I then began to research more into these protection programs and started to find a bunch of statistics. Now at first glance it just seems that there were a bunch of numbers thrown at me all spread across a world map. It wasn’t until I started to read further into the numbers that it wasn’t just a number it was a human life. It was a life that was lost during their line of duty as a journalist. There was a total of 71 deaths that had a motive behind their deaths. That meant that each of those deaths were intentional. It was a disturbing fact to find and it just drove me over the edge. I came into this module with a passion to find out more about journalism and how much it has changed over time. In some ways it has with the way technology gives them better access for people to get right into the heart of the action. It also showed me how dangerous it is to just get down to the truth and for men and women to take a risk to voice the unvoiced. I decided to make a video as my final product of this project. I am going to find images, clips from videos, add personal audio of my voice and have a song in the background to just shine a light on journalism for how unappreciated it is right now. This is what i have so far and I can’t wait to give you guys the final product.

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About this Course

This is the homepage for Computer Science 104 (also known as "The Internet Course") taught by Jim Groom and Paul Bond at the University of Mary Washington. For more information take a look at the current syllabus or check out the about page.